Skip to content

R compiled under windows 64 bit???

3 messages · Alex Gracian, Uwe Ligges, Peter Dalgaard

Original
Alex Gracian
# 
Hi,

Any plans to realse in Cran binaries for R base & packages, for Windows
using 64bit, now that the AMD 64 is coming out?

It seems a perfect match for cost effective high performane number
crunching??

Many thanks,

Alex Gracian
Uwe Ligges
#
Alex Gracian wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        
No plans, AFAIK.
Are you volunteering to compile R base (there may be need for some 
adjustments in the code, as well as in the Makefiles) for CRAN?
The maintainer would need both, an AMD 64 machine, and a 64-bit Windows 
in order to compile.
I'm volunteering to make the packages, if you'll buy an AMD 64 machine + 
64-bit Windows for my office. ;-)

            

      
      
      
    

        
I don't know whether it will be much faster to use the 64bit mode, 
because the internal structure of x86 processors for number crunching 
already has been 80 bit for floating point arithmetics. Additionally, 
you will need more RAM for the same problems which slows down some 
calculations.
In principle, you can extend the 2GB limit of the R process, though.

Uwe Ligges

            

      
      
      
    

        

      
      
    

  
  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Peter Dalgaard
    

    

      
      #
    

  


  

      
Uwe Ligges <ligges@statistik.uni-dortmund.de> writes:

            

      
      
      
    

        
You may regret that statement, once you realize that you also need the
entire 64bit toolchain...

            

      
      
      
    

        
Yes. And we do actually bump into that when we try to do something
sufficiently "stupid". Recent case: attempting to fit a polr() to weekly
data for 2500 persons for one year each, including 2500 person levels,
giving a design matrix of ~2.5GB. Some times you do want to try that
sort of thing by brute force and ignorance (of course, raising the
memory limit might just have revealed further obstacles...)

I would say that the perfect match currently is the SuSE Linux product
for AMD-64. I don't think people quite realize how much extra work
goes into maintaining the Windows platform (about as much as the
Unix/Linux variants combined, I'd say), and we basically only do it
because of its market penetration.